Day: February 23, 2011

Another government watchdog group is demanding an investigation into whether Wisconsin Republican Governor Scott Walker abused his power in the fight to pass his controversial “budget repair bill.” Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, a Washington, DC, outfit, asked Wisconsin’s Government Accountability Board in a letter sent Wednesday to probe whether Walker broke state law when he sent State Patrollers to locate state Senate Democratic leader Matt Miller.

That’s where Walker violated the law, CREW alleges. “Nothing in the agency’s mission indicates WSP officers may be sent on political errands by the governor or members of the state legislature,” CREW executive director Melanie Sloan writes. In particular, CREW points to Wisconsin law that says state troopers “may not be used in or take part in any dispute or controversy between an employer and employee concerning wages, hours, labor, or working conditions.” CREW’s Sloan concludes, “By abusing his position as governor to ask the WSP to send a message to Sen. Miller, Governor Walker obtained an unlawful benefit—the use of the troopers—in an effort to gain an advantage in his wage dispute with the state’s public employees.”

That a good call screening procedure could be all the difference between gloating to your billionaire tea party financier how you’re getting all Reaganlike, or spilling your game plan to dude with a blog.

On Saturday night, when Mother Jones staffers tweeted a report that riot police might soon sweep demonstrators out of the Wisconsin capitol building—something that didn’t end up happening—one Twitter user sent out a chilling public response: “Use live ammunition.”

From my own Twitter account, I confronted the user, JCCentCom. He tweeted back that the demonstrators were “political enemies” and “thugs” who were “physically threatening legally elected officials.” In response to such behavior, he said, “You’re damned right I advocate deadly force.” He later called me a “typical leftist,” adding, “liberals hate police.”

Only later did we realize that JCCentCom was a deputy attorney general for the state of Indiana.